Harvard University files patent lawsuit against GlobalFoundries

Harvard University has filed a lawsuit against semiconductor companies GlobalFoundries and Micron Technology for patent infringement.

The complaints, filed June 24 in U.S. District Court for the District of Massachusetts, said the chip makers infringed on patents awarded to Harvard between 2001 and 2009 based on research conducted at the university.

Harvard's patents cover methods to add thin films of metals and other materials onto surfaces, such as an insulating layer on semiconductor memory chips. That technology was invented by professor Roy G. Gordon and members of his Harvard laboratory in the late 1990s and early 2000s.

The complaint said GlobalFoundries' manufacturing facilities in the United States make certain products using processes and materials that infringe on Harvard's patents. Specifically, the complaint said the process is used to make Power8 processors used in Tyan servers, among other products.

Harvard is requesting a jury trial in the complaint.

GlobalFoundries operates three factories in the U.S., including one in Saratoga County, New York. The company is owned by an arm of the Abu Dhabi government.

A spokesman for GlobalFoundries said the company does not comment on pending litigation.

In the last six years, GlobalFoundries has invested $15 billion in the plant in Malta, about 30 miles north of Albany. The company has secured the right to buy more land that could be used for a second factory in Malta, though that decision is still years out.

GlobalFoundries, headquartered in Sunnyvale, California, also has factories in East Fishkill; Essex Junction, Vermont; Germany; and Singapore.

Micron Technology (NASDAQ: MU), based in Boise, Idaho, is a publicly traded company that makes flash memory cards and other semiconductor devices. The company did not immediately respond to a request for comment.

The suit comes at a time when universities are more aggressively going after companies for violating patents. Earlier this year, Apple settled a patent dispute with Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute in Troy, New York, for $25 million.